Printed onto 310g German Etching Paper and signed and dated by the artist.
Print Size: 594mm x 841mm
Paper Size: 604mm x 851mm.
Edition of 25 only
'Valentino 1530' is part of an ongoing series of works that juxtapose portraits of women from art with images of modern day couture as a way of questioning the external forces that exist within both art and fashion which shape and enforce our understanding of the ideals around women’s status in society.
Lucrezia Sommaria, the woman in this 1530 portrait by Ridolfo Ghirlandaio is depicted looking away to one side. This is the typical pose for portraits of women from this time, apparently symbolising demureness. Women were not expected to look people/men directly in the eyes as this was deemed to be brazen behaviour. Indeed our Lucrezia seems to have an almost passive expression on her face, almost as if she's trying to be seen as the artist or perhaps the commissioner of the portrait wants her to be. I wonder what she was really like. In her off guard moments. She seems quite elusive. Fragile even. So I've reimagined her in this modern interpretation of fragility in this sheer dress from Valentino. I like the symmetry between the images created some 500 years apart.